[book review]

Rock and Roll Madman

Tearing Down the Wall of Sound: The Rise and Fall of Phil Spector

Reviewed by William Wheaton

Tearing Down the Wall of Sound: The Rise and Fall of Phil Spector by Mick Brown is the latest biography of legendary rock and roll producer Phil Spector who, at time of writing, nears the completion of his murder trial. Many people are familiar with the story about how when they recorded the album Death of a Lady’s Man together, Phil Spector put a gun to singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen’s neck and said “I love you, Leonard” to which Leonard Cohen is said to have responded “I hope you do, Phil”. But what I learned recently from reading Mick Brown’s new biography of Spector, is that Spector later claimed that Cohen is actually a big fan of, and “deeply influenced” by the Partridge Family. Many people know that Spector’s father committed suicide when he was a boy, but the new book reveals his parents were first cousins. That’s the kind of detail of rock and roll’s most infamous, alcoholic, firearms enthusiast’s decline into madness that Brown’s new book goes into. This is it — complete documentation of complete insanity.

I’ve been waiting for this for years, having my own background with rock and roll and guns. I may have even come close to coming into contact with Spector a few years ago. The first issue of my magazine AeonElectron was going to include an interview with the New York girl-goth band Goodnight Gunfight because their drummer Jesse had Spector calling her house all the time- her roommate had some sort of friendship and/or dating thing with his daughter Nicole Spector. Since my grandfather invented the M-14 and Spector’s obviously really into guns I was going to try to lure him into an interview, but Goodnight Gunfight were three very spoiled young women and impossible to work with, so I let it go. I’ve read a lot on Spector, and I’d say the Brown biography is essential for anyone interested in the topic.

It’s a topic that may keep you going too; the principal architect of the classic, warm “girl group” pop sound of the early 60’s was by almost universal accounts a hardened misogynist who liked to get drunk and point loaded guns at people’s heads- and it’s continued for decades. At the beginning of Tearing Down the Wall Of Sound, Brown recounts meeting Spector at his home and recounts Spector’s articulate admission in his own words:

“Insane is a hard word, but it’s manic depressive, bipolar. I take medication for schizophrenia, but I wouldn’t say I’m schizophrenic…I have devils inside that fight me. And I’m my own worst enemy”.

Brown was the first person to do a major interview with Spector in twenty-five years. His interview with Spector was published right before Spector was arrested in early 2003 for the alleged murder of B-movie legend Lana Clarkson, who was working as a waitress at the House of Blues club where Spector had been out drinking. The defense claimed it was suicide, but Spector sure likes his liquor and handguns.

We get it all in this one- from Spector’s admission that his parents were first cousins and his father’s suicide when he was nine right up to the famous courtroom photograph of him in the giant blond Afro-wig. This new book, written by a man who interviewed Spector right before he was arrested on charges of murder, goes into more detail about his murder case then Dave Thompson’s biography Wall of Pain: A Biography of Phil Spector released a few years ago. For example, Brown gives the details about many of the women who testified that Spector pointed guns at their heads (a mere fraction of the violence and gun-related incidents involving Spector in the book were discussed in the trial) and the recent legal battles with his former personal assistant Michelle Blaine. He accused her of embezzlement and she accused him of sexual harassment. There’s everything from accusations of sexual abuse by Spector by his adopted son Donte, who became a drug addict and male prostitute and now has AIDS, to incidents involving guns and recording legends from John Lennon up through punk.

It would be unfair to call this the definitive Phil Spector biography. Dave Thompson’s Wall of Pain: A Biography of Phil Spector is also excellent, and covers a number of musical topics that Brown’s book does not. For example, the rivalry between Phil Spector and Joe Meek, the British rockabilly producer who shot his landlady and himself in 1967 is curiously absent from Brown’s book but present in Thompson’s. On the other hand, Thompson’s biography does not go into nearly the comprehensive and up-to-date detail of Spector’s legal and psychological problems that Brown’s does.

If you read up on Spector you will never be able to listen to his familiar golden oldies greats like “And Then He Kissed Me” quite the same again. Rock and roll musicians I still care about are numbered these days, but Spector is there, in my nightmares even.

WW

[The photo above from the Spector trial was found by the editor on William Wheaton’s myspace, which he attributed to Rolling Stone magazine. In it the accused murderer is said to be demonstrating bullet trajectory.]